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Agatha Christie

The Sunday Times Bestseller

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Agatha Christie

By: Lucy Worsley
Narrated by: Lucy Worsley
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About this listen

 'A smart and highly entertaining portrait of a literary powerhouse'
- THE TIMES BOOKS OF THE YEAR

'A riveting portrait'
- GUARDIAN BOOKS OF THE YEAR

***
'Worsley's sparkling biography brings a fresh eye to Christie's life and work, firmly busting the myth that she, or her novels, were cosy.' Daily Mail

'Every Christie fan should read this' - The Times

'Shows the Queen of Crime in a new light.' - Daily Telegraph

'Worsley's book excels in bringing a broader historical perspective to Christie's life and work, and her enthusiasm is infectious.' - Observer

***

'Nobody in the world was more inadequate to act the heroine than I was.'

Why did Agatha Christie spend her career pretending that she was 'just' an ordinary housewife, when clearly she wasn't? As Lucy Worsley says, 'She was thrillingly, scintillatingly modern'. She went surfing in Hawaii, she loved fast cars, and she was intrigued by the new science of psychology, which helped her through devastating mental illness.

So why - despite all the evidence to the contrary - did Agatha present herself as a retiring Edwardian lady of leisure?
She was born in 1890 into a world which had its own rules about what women could and couldn't do. Lucy Worsley's biography is not just of an internationally renowned bestselling writer. It's also the story of a person who, despite the obstacles of class and gender, became an astonishingly successful working woman.

With access to personal letters and papers that have rarely been seen, Lucy Worsley's biography is both authoritative and entertaining and makes us realise what an extraordinary pioneer Agatha Christie was - truly a woman who wrote the twentieth century.©2022 Miller House Limited 20th Century Art & Literature Authors Literary History & Criticism Modern Women Biography Thought-Provoking

Critic Reviews

Every Christie fan should read this.
Shows the Queen of Crime in a new light.
Worsley's sparkling biography brings a fresh eye to Christie's life and work, firmly busting the myth that she, or her novels, were cosy.
All stars
Most relevant
Thorough, insightful and balanced description and review of Christie's life and her works. Lucy Worsley brings to vivid life the worlds of her subjects in ways that few other manage to do. This work enhanced my understanding of Christie as a writer and a woman and the complexity of her works across the decades. I highly recommend this book to others!

Insightful, revealing biography with Lucy's trademark enthralling narration!

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Thank you, Lucy Worsley, for bringing Agatha Christie to life in such a wonderful way.

A wonderful story

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I recommend this thoughtful audiobook, read by the author, to all Agatha Christie fans. It gives some insight into the person Agatha was and the world she lived in. It gives credit to her amazing and unrivaled contribution to detective writing and explains where many of the ideas in her stories originated.

Enjoyable and thoughtful

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The personality of Christie comes through really well, for her brilliance, prejudices and flaws. As a great historical biography does, we see Agatha’s actions in the the contemporary context we do often fail to note in the age of twitter and social media. A conservative woman indeed, but also one that normalised the age of the female crime writer as one capable of complex, twisting plots and curious characters. Her works can stand the test of time with little modification and continue to entertain and sell widely. Great storytelling by Lucy Worsely. Perhaps a little long and the early chapters feel somewhat bland. But I understood Christie so much better now, alongside the little understood issue of mental health which I believe describes her famous disappearance. Well worth it.

Great contextual overview

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style of writing and delivery had me happily listening all the way through, just like all documentaries by this my favourite of all historians!

engaged me all the way

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